What Skills Does An MBA Give You?
1. Strategy & Finance
2. Sales
3. Communication & Management
4. Brand & Marketing
5. Pricing
6. Customer Research
7. Leadership & Influence
What skills does an MBA give you? If you’re asking that question, you’re in the right place.
I bet you’re looking to gain MBA skills and broaden your business education. Perhaps, you’re also wondering why the cost of an MBA is so high.
What do you learn in business school that makes it so darn expensive? After all, MBA skills are widely taught online – it’s not as if a secret treasure trove of business genius hides within the classrooms of Harvard and Wharton.
Few of today’s industries face more scrutiny than higher education – especially business education. With higher education costs growing at a rate that drastically outpaces inflation, potential students have plenty of reason to scratch their heads.
While top MBA programs in the US offer some great opportunities, today’s business education landscape begs the question: What’s the best option to learn MBA skills? This post explores the pillars of a great MBA or alternative MBA program, as well as some of the top business education options on the market today.
MBA Skills Overview
The MBA skills covered in any business education program will depend on the nuances of the program. Some business education focuses closely on subsectors of the greater business world. Common examples include entrepreneurship, HR management, leadership skills, or international business.
While the short answer here is “it depends,” there are some staple MBA skills that will be covered in just about any program – whether you’re spending top dollar for your education, or saving with a more accessible option. Below are a few examples.
MBA Skills #1: Strategy & Finance
A broad category in and of itself, Strategy & Finance finds its way into just about any MBA program. This could mean a lot of things. Generating and growing revenue, understanding P&L statements, running a comprehensive competitor analysis, etc. A proficient business education requires sufficient education of the market strategy and financials driving and supporting any business.
MBA Skills #2: Sales & Marketing
Often considered to be inseparable cogs in any well run business machine, sales and marketing typically find their ways into a quality business education. A great product is nothing without the skills required to market and sell it. Whether or not you’re destined for a future in one of these fields, you should graduate from business school with a solid understanding of each.
MBA Skills #3: Communication & Management
There’s a reason some of the most famous business leaders are excellent communicators. Learning how to speak fluently about business-related activities – in front of internal team members or external stakeholders – is a key part of a quality business education. And that ability to communicate inevitably becomes a key part of influencing and managing others.
Other MBA Skills
The above list is a good start, but it’s far from comprehensive. One top ranked mini-MBA program offered by brunchwork.com, called Business Intensive, points to the 8 core business skills listed below. These skills build the foundation of our top-rated, 7-week program.
As the brunchwork program shows, a complete business education covers additional MBA skills, like Branding, Customer Research, Pricing, and even Web Development.
MBA Skills, Without The Student Loans
Since you are researching “What skills does an MBA give you?,” you’ve likely discovered that business education comes in many forms.
Like any field of study, there are countless methods and practices for achieving comprehensive knowledge of the business world. There are many types of MBA programs: full-time and part-time, online and offline, general and specialized, traditional and modern.
Business education can be gained through expensive MBA programs at traditional institutions. Alternatively, “mini MBA” and other alternative MBA programs offer an attractive, flexible and affordable option. More on that later.
Mini MBA vs. Traditional MBA Degree Programs
So how does a mini-MBA stack up compared to traditional MBA programs? In a nutshell, mini-MBAs are vastly more affordable (traditional MBAs cost upwards of $200k), and the best ones provide a similar breadth of education…in much less time.
Take Business Intensive, once again. For less than $2,000, a complete education on critical MBA skills can be earned in just a couple months. A key part of packing so much skill development into such a concise timeframe lies in the way the education is structured.
brunchwork embraces a “flipped classroom,” which takes attention away from lectures and textbooks, and instead emphasizes collaboration, discussion, and immersive learning. When students actively apply what they are learning in real-time, the MBA skills stick.
What do the results look like?
• Six-figure promotions at top tech companies
• Successful business pitches that result in multi-million dollar budgets
• Start-up launches to the tune of six-figure monthly revenue!
This flipped classroom style breaks away from the theoretical approach that defines many traditional MBAs. While there is a time and place for learning business theory, how many times have you heard successful founders and executives claim they learned more in the field than in school? We see that all the time – which is why the Business Intensive is proving to be such a successful shift in the business education world.
For many, the choice is easy. Take advantage of a modern approach to business education at 1% of the cost of traditional MBA programs? A growing percentage of today’s aspiring business leaders are saying, “Count me in.”